Neo Instruments Ventilator II

Neo Instruments Ventilator II Rotary Speaker Simulator is my third dedicated rotary pedal. I researched the best sounding Leslie pedals before buying. I was quite impressed with the Ventilator II ever since seeing it on That Pedal Show. The price is a bit scary. One reason I did not buy it sooner. I felt there were some that would do the job for a cheaper price, but in the end, I wanted the one that sounded the best. So I ignored the price, and purchased the Ventilator II.

I have owned The DLS Effects RotoSIM and the EHX Lester G which are also great sounding Leslie rotary speaker simulators. Both are worthy, but the DLS was large and not true bypass and was not in love with what it did to my guitar tone when not using it. In fact, I even put it on a pedal switcher, so my signal did not go through the DLS Effects RotoSIM when off. I did eventually sell the DLS Effects RotoSIM, which I regretted.

Interesting story is I originally bought the DLS Effects RotoSIM used on eBay. After owning it a few years I decided to sell it. So I placed it on eBay and it sold fast… To the SAME GUY I bought it from years earlier! He missed it and wanted it back on his pedalboard. We both laughed about it. Well soon after I missed it myself as that Leslie speaker sound it creates was intoxicating.

After selling the DLS Effects RotoSIM, I tried a few chorusing/vibe pedals that offered a Leslie simulated sound. For many this may would work out fine, especially when you factor in a smaller pedal and less expensive option. My next dedicated Leslie SIM pedal was the EHX Lester G, which is an excellent pedal that even includes a compressor. Only had this one a short time. After watching and listening to many demos I decided the Neo Instruments Ventilator II was for me. The EHX is great, but I bit more effect sounding, not quite as authentic.

Don Leslie created the Leslie speaker as an add-on for a Hammond organ to replicate the spread of sound made by a pipe organ. I doubt he had any idea that some enterprising guitar slingers would find this sound and use to such great effect!

The Leslie speaker effect applied to guitars has a long history on iconic recordings from the Beatles, Badfinger, Pink Floyd, Hendrix, Led Zepplin, Peter Frampton, Stevie Ray Vaughan, etc. Carrying around an expensive and quite heavy Leslie cabinet is not something many of can do practically. If you love the sound of an authentic sounding rotary speaker cabinet, you may be looking for the right stompbox to get that sound.

Neo Instruments is a German company that seems to one thing and do it extremely well. The Neo Ventilator II considered by many to be the best Leslie rotary speaker simulator pedal on the market today. In a field that has quite a lot of great pedals that can provide excellent Leslie sounds that is quite impressive.

The Neo Instruments Ventilator II emulates the Leslie 122 rotary cabinet quite well. Featuring independent treble and bass rotor speeds, the crossover (800Hz), and even that rich tube drive that the classic Leslie adds to your sound. This is the second-generation Ventilator pedal and it adds a stereo input, separate slow and fast speed controls, separate distance controls, and expression pedal control. Can be used for keyboards or guitars. I am using this exclusively on guitar.

The Ventilator II is built like a truck and is rugged for the road. It allows you not only to switch between two different rotary speeds, you can now set each speed to fine-tune your sound. The Ventilator II is built into a tough folded-metal enclosure, which has five recessed rotary controls and three footswitches… Bypass, slow/fast and the additional switch acts as a brake. True bypass and you can get an optional remote footswitch for even more control on the floor.

All five knobs have dual functions. The Bypass and Fast/Slow footswitches act in the manner of a shift-lock key, allowing to adjust the fast and slow speeds, the horn/drum balance, the ramping acceleration, the drive, the footswitch and speaker emulation modes, the mic distance from the drum and horn (part of the travel also functions as a mix control so that you can output a mix of dry and treated signal), the level and the remote function. The Remote pot position determines which remote function is selected. Additional programmability can be accessed via a ‘power up with buttons down’ routine to change the operation of the footswitches from latching to momentary in various combinations, and it’s also possible to select two different guitar modes (one with mid and high boost as well as the speaker emulation). Hard to beat the Ventilator II for its authentic sound and its tweak ability. Probably the closest you can get to the owning and using a Leslie 122 speaker!

Doing a convincing simulation of an Leslie speaker is not simple, as there many interacting acoustic, mechanical and electronic elements. The original Leslie sound is created using a motor that rotates a drum reflector for the bass speaker and a rotating horn that feeds a static tweeter (it is counterbalanced by a dummy horn) for the highs. The two frequency ranges are split via an 800Hz crossover. Vintage Leslie 122 and 147 models featured a 40W valve amp that could be overdriven that also make a big contribution to the overall tone. This motion is designed to add Doppler pitch modulation. The tonality and amplitude change as the drum or horn aperture moves away from the listener’s ear. The two motors that do the rotation also have brakes that allow the high and low rotors to run at different speeds, rotate in opposite directions, and, when switching from slow to fast or applying the brakes, change speed at different rates.

Bottom line, this pedal when used in stereo sounds as close to a REAL Leslie as anything I’ve heard with electric guitar. Pretty easy to use out of the box, and after a short time fiddling with actual knobs you achieve most every Leslie tones. Sounds killer with an overdrive in front. If you are serious about Leslie tones you will love this box, but it comes at a price.

Neo Instruments Ventilator II Rotary Speaker Pedal Features: